


The essence of being needed

by all_that_glitters (orphan_account)



Category: Arrow (TV 2012), The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Arrow Season 5 finale, Flash Season 3 finale, Fluff and Angst, No Smut, Spoilers, fuck both finales but whatever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-20
Updated: 2017-06-20
Packaged: 2018-11-16 09:40:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11250489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/all_that_glitters
Summary: After Savitar, and after Prometheus, Barry and Oliver need each other. Plain and simple.





	The essence of being needed

**Author's Note:**

> I refuse to accept HR's death, so Iris dies, and I'm not sad about it. Also, everyone gets off the island eventually, but the circumstances of that aren't up to me- anyway, yeah. These two sad puppies just cry in each others' arms and then pep talk each other and then become superhusbands i think

Logically, Barry knew he shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t be anywhere near here, if Savitar was to be believed. But Oliver needed him, and he would always be what Oliver needed. He took a deep breath and held it for several seconds. He shifted from foot to foot. Maybe he was the last person Oliver would want to see. Then again, everyone thought he was gone. Trapped in the speed force. That hadn’t lasted long. So maybe Ollie  _ should  _ see him… Barry took another deep breath, and opened the door to the loft. 

“Oliver?” Barry called. The room was empty. Silent. Barry tried again, “Ollie, it’s Barry. I- I’m here.” No response. Barry pressed his lips together, finding himself turning round and round in the empty room. Where else could Oliver be? He had tried the “Arrow Cave”, as he and Thea so endearingly called it. And he already knew William was with Roy- “Jason”, whatever- in Opal City. William was safe. But where was Ollie? He decided to try one last time, and then he would look around the city one last time, and then he’d run home. No. He wouldn’t go back to Central. Iris was dead. He didn’t have a home there. Shaking away  _ those _ thoughts, Barry yelled one last time. “OLIVER!”

“Barry?” croaked a quiet voice, from the direction of the stairs. 

“Ollie!” Barry gasped, whipping around to face him. His heart sank. Ollie stood there, pointing an arrow at him. But he looked weak. Pale and haggard. He’d lost weight since the last time Barry’d seen him, and he seemed… hollow, somehow. Barry knew he didn’t look much better, but still. “Oliver,” he began, moving slowly toward him with his hand outstretched. “It’s me. Barry. For real.” 

Oliver tightened his grip on the bow. “Impossible,” he muttered. “I talked to Cisco. Caitlin gone, Bar gone, Iris dead. Who. Are.  _ You _ .” Barry moved closer. From here, he could see Oliver’s hand on the bow trembling slightly. He gently covered Ollie’s hand, bringing his arm down, lowering the bow. 

“I promise you, Ollie, it’s me,” Barry said softly. “I- I got out. The Speed Force let me go.”

“No- no, C-Cisco said he’d call if- if anything-” Oliver broke off, taking in a breath. Barry looked into his eyes. 

“I didn’t go to Central when they let me out. I- I came straight here when Gideon told me. I had to see you. Ollie, I’m so sorry,” Barry whispered. “I could have saved-” he was cut off, interrupted by the sound of the bow clattering to the floor, and then the feeling of arms around him surprised him. Oliver buried his face in Barry’s jacket, sobbing. Shocked, Barry could do little more than stand there, until he regained his wits, using his speed to maneuver them off the stairs and to the couch. 

“Barry,” Oliver choked, burying his face in Barry’s chest once more. Barry’s heart broke. He thought of everyone Oliver had lost- his sister, the mother of his child, Dig,  _ Felicity _ … and suddenly he wanted nothing more than to kill Adrian a second time. 

“Ollie, it’s okay. You’re okay,” he said, pulling away, looking at Oliver. He cupped his hands around his face, gently brushing away the tears with his thumbs. “Stop that. It’s okay.”

“I-I didn’t- I thought I wasn’t gonna see you ever again, Bar… everyone’s gone. I c-can’t,  _ God _ -” he cut off, closing his eyes. Barry adjusted them on the couch, until he was sitting at one end, with his back pressed against the armrest, and Oliver was between his outstretched legs, his arms wrapped around Barry’s middle, his cheek resting on Barry’s stomach. Barry’s hands drifted over the expanse of Oliver’s back, smoothing out wrinkles in his T-shirt, rubbing circles into his shoulders, tracing his fingers down his spine. 

“I’m sorry, Oliver. I’m so so sorry. If I had just been faster, I could have saved them. All of them. But I was so focused on saving Iris, and I’m just so sorry,” Barry repeated in a whisper over and over. They stayed there, like that, together, for what could have been hours. Eventually, Oliver calmed down, and he content to just  _ feel _ this man, who was alive, and breathing, and he was just so  _ glad _ , but- Barry was crying? That wasn’t right. Oliver pulled back and looked at him. 

“Barry,” he started, “None of this is your fault. Not Savitar, or Caitlin, and definitely not Adrian.” Oliver could feel Barry shaking his head frantically. He pulled himself up, to where he was eye to eye with Barry. “I’m serious, Bar. You may be the fastest man alive, but that doesn’t mean everything that happens is your fault.”

“Ollie, I don’t know who I am… seeing how broken Savitar was, it- that- he was-  _ is _ me. I don’t want to become him. And I could- what if I, you could be hurt, you could  _ die _ , Ol, and I  _ can’t _ \- you can’t die. You can’t not be alive because then I’d-” Oliver cut him off, sitting up, turning Barry so that his legs were dangling off the couch. He grabbed Barry’s hand and pressed it to his chest. 

“Feel that? I’m alive, Barry. I’m alive, so do not push me away, because I’m not going anywhere. For all of this, for everything that’s happened and that’s going to happen, we have to have each other. We have to keep each other from taking that one step into the darkness, okay? Promise me. Promise me that we’re going to have each other, because we have no one else. Please, Bar.” Oliver said all this while staring into Barry’s eyes, mimicking Barry’s earlier action of cupping his face and brushing away his tears. Barry nodded slightly.

“I promise, Ollie. We have each other.” 

And they did. For everything that happened after, from Oliver finding out that Thea and Dig and Felicity and the rest of the team were okay, to Barry eventually having to step back into the role of the Flash, they had each other. When asked what changed, Barry would give a sad smile, and simply say, “Circumstance brought us together once, and it kept us together later..” Oliver would give the same smile, and say, “I needed Barry in a way I never needed anyone else, and he was there when no one else could be.”

 


End file.
